It was only after they had wheeled Mike away to surgery to remove the bullet lodged in his leg, that Jill would submit to being examined herself. Even then, she was uncooperative and argumentative, until Liz Conners stepped into the room.
"You want me to sedate you?' Was the first thing her friend said to her.
"No, ma'am." Was Jill's quick response.
"You look like hell, Jill." Liz said then, her eyes filling with tears. She turned to one of the nurses beside her and said gruffly. "Look away, Gloria. I'm gonna hug her and I don't want you telling people I've got a heart." She wrapped her arms around Jill and embraced her. "You scared me to death. You okay?"
"The girls are . . ."
"Beth's with them. They are fine." Liz said, her hands still on Jill's shoulders. "They are fine."
"I can't . . .I . . ." She struggled for words, tears rolling down her cheeks. "It was a pretty crappy day."
"Easy, honey." Liz said rubbing her back. "Let Gloria take care of you, okay? Mike's gonna be fine, you know that, right?"
Jill nodded silently.
"Okay, then, so now we just make sure you are okay. Then you can take care of him, alright?"
"Thank you, Liz." Jill said at last. "Thanks for everything. I'm sorry about the other day. I didn't mean . . ."
"Oh, don't worry about that. I hated me too, just then." She kissed Jill's forehead. "Let Gloria take care of you."
Her wrist was broken and after the x-ray and cast, they argued about admitting her. She was dehydrated and exhausted, and because of her recent round of chemo still frail. They were concerned that she would not rest unless they forced her to. In the end the put her in a double room with Mike - breaking about six hospital policies.
"Trust me," Liz Conners said. "She'll stay put if Mike's here."
His surgery took less time than her examinations, arguments and cast. She found him sleeping peacefully when she was finally taken to their room. It was only then, breathing a deep sigh of relief, that she began to look around for everyone else.
She stepped out into the hallway, and glanced around to find Terry slumped in a chair looking weary and grey. Seeing her, he rose quickly.
"What are you doing walking around?"
"I wanted to . . ."
"Get back in bed!" He sounded furious and Jill's brow furrowed in lines of confusion.
"I was just . . ."
"I'll pick you up and carry you to bed! Turn around and walk!"
Her brown eyes filled with tears, and she slowly turned and walked back to the room. Terry followed behind her. She chewed at the corner of her lip, feeling both hurt and angry. She climbed back into the bed, and was surprised to find Terry, gently tucking the covers around her.
"I'm sorry, Jill." He said softly, not meeting her eyes but staring at his own hands that smoothed the corner of her blanket over and over. "There's so much going on . . . and . . . I need to see you and Mike are okay. I didn't mean to be so . . .I'm sorry."
She caught his hand in hers and squeezed his fingers.
"Hey, it's okay." She tried to meet his eyes, but he kept his head down. "Tell me about Chris."
He shook his head. "I don't know. He's in surgery and it is pretty bad. He got hit twice. You saw." He met her eyes.
"I did."
She still held his hand and could feel that he was trembling, she felt guilty that Beth was with her children, rather than here with her husband. She was surprised that Terry felt so strongly about Chris. They'd hadn't been close, especially after Chris and Megan split. She glanced around, a sudden sinking feeling settling in her chest.
"Where's Eddie?" Her voice was small and hesitant, as she realized that since they'd been brought in to the hospital she hadn't seen him, not once.
Terry looked up at her then, and her eyes grew wide as she could see tears in his eyes. She could feel her blood pressure rise and her heart race increase.
"Terry?"
"Listen, honey, why don't you just . . ." He stalled.
"No. Tell me."
He glanced over at where Mike lay still asleep. "I wish he was . . ." He sighed looking back at her and meeting her eyes. "He's in surgery, too." He said at long last.
"Why?" She whispered.
"They said it . . ." The tears escaped now, and two rolled down his face. "I'm so sorry, Jill, but they said it was a heart attack and they don't know if . . ."
Her eyes filled with tears and she turned her face away from him. He stood where he was holding her hand in one of his and gently rubbing her shoulder with his other, as he listened to her sobs. Finally, she turned and faced him.
"Lee Borden is dead?" She asked and the anger in her voice stunned him.
"Yes, Chris shot him."
"I hate him." She said bitterly. "I hate him. I hope he rots in hell."
He'd never heard her talk like that. Never. Her compassion had always impressed him. He had supposed it was what made her a good nurse; she had an innate ability to consider what other people were thinking and feeling. It was what made her a good friend. He had been shocked in those days after they'd pulled her out of that abandoned boxcar, to see her compassion toward Winfield, who had kidnapped her and shot Mike. He had finally asked her about it.
"I don't know, Terry. Maybe I'm still just exhausted and mixed up." She had told him. Which was entirely possible. She wouldn't leave Mike's side.
"But he . . ."
"I know what he did." She said calmly. "I was there, and if I think of it . . ." Her voice became choked with tears and he reached out and put a steadying arm around her.
"Never mind." He said quickly. "I'm sorry. You don't need to explain anything. Don't be upset." He kissed her forehead.
"I'm okay." She said swallowing down tears. "I can start to cry over just about anything. It's residual stress, I guess. I didn't cry until you found me."
He nodded his head, clearly able to picture her that way; terrified and yet stoic. She was impressively strong. In the years he'd known her, he had come to the conclusion that Jill Danko was tougher than all of the SC police force put together.
"I guess," She hesitated clearly trying to find a way to express it to him. "I guess, I just feel sorry for him. He's made bad choices, but it wasn't like anyone ever stepped in and cared enough to stop him. He was just, I don't know, pathetic really. I mean, don't get me wrong, I was completely terrified that he would kill me, and he planned on having me killed, but I felt sorry for him just the same."
Terry had blinked rapidly trying to absorb this, and thinking, at the time, that he would never, ever find a woman as good as her; thinking for the ten thousandth time that Michael Danko was pretty damn lucky.
"Why don't you lie back and rest?" He said to her now. "I'll stay right here, and wake you if there's any news."
"You should go home to Beth." She said. "She needs to feel your arms around her."
"I talked to her earlier. She's okay." He said.
"She was lying to you." Jill said with a raised eyebrow.
"Amanda's on her way to the lake house. Beth will come here later."
"She'll hop in that car and push the pedal to the floor all the way here." She said turning to look at him. "Have someone send a car to pick her up. Trust me, I know about this."
"I wasn't even really in danger. I was on the second team. I told her that."
"Terry, you ever been a cop's wife?" She asked him. He shook his head. "I've been one for nearly seventeen years, so just trust me. She hasn't slept. She hasn't eaten. She hasn't done anything but think about your hand in hers, and how she's gonna raise your babies without you."
He met her eye saying nothing. He couldn't imagine the life of a police officer's wife. He had told Mike the truth when he had said that he had left active duty for a life of teaching at the academy because it all became too much for him, but that wasn't all of his reason. It had been impossible to ignore the fear in Beth's eyes.
One of the last, and worst days had involved a stand-off with a deranged father. He had been first on the scene and found himself in a room with a four year old girl, and her clearly insane father. He had tried desperately to talk the man into releasing her, but he'd been convinced that the child would be better off dead than with his ex-wife. After seventeen hours, of pleading and begging, the man had seemed to calm and relent. He handed the little girl a cup of water, which she eagerly drank saying a soft, "Thank you, Daddy." He had smiled a strange smile, and then turned and shot himself; his blood splattering both Terry and the little girl. He had lifted the sobbing child into his arms, and she clung to him briefly but then began to convulse. She died a few minutes later in his arms while the sound of sirens rang in his ears. It was later that they had discovered her father had poisoned her, and done it right in front of Terry.
He hated waited with her small body until the coroner came, made his report and then stood dazed in the middle of the station, which buzzed with activity all around him. They had sent him home then. He stood blinking for five minutes at Lt. Peters, who was in charge at the time, and then wordlessly had turned to leave. He was walking out the doors of the station house, when Mike caught up to him and grabbed him by the arm.
"You gotta change, brother." He said gently.
"What?" Terry had asked still dazed.
"Your uniform. You are covered in . . . you can't go home to Beth like that."
He glanced down, confused. "But she must be worried. I should . . ."
"Jill's with her. I called her and she's staying with her until you get there." Terry looked up at Mike numbly. "Come on, Terry. You can take a shower and change. Beth would . . . you can't do that to her."
He pulled him along down the hall and back into the locker room. Terry found that he couldn't really function; just stood there dumbly. He was glad to see that the locker room was relatively empty, because Mike began to unbutton his shirt for him.
"Let's get this off." He said as though Terry were a small child, and he had complied like a small child, sliding his arms out of his blood-stained shirt. Mike tried to take it from him, but Terry held it in his hands studying it. He finally tossed aside and looking at Mike said softly, "The things we do to our women." His voice held deep pain, and Mike's face grew dark, knowing just what Terry meant; it was the burden of all married officers.
"Yeah," Mike said gruffly. "The things we do to our women."
Looking back on it, Terry realized that it was that moment that he'd decided to teach. He couldn't do it anymore. Couldn't work his way through the violent end of another small child; couldn't say to his wife, 'Don't worry! I'll be home for dinner!', couldn't rush into a situation that might or might not leave his sweet wife alone to raise their children.
He looked down at Jill now, who lay in a hospital bed, weeping. The only reason she lay there now was because of Mike's career choice. She would never had encountered Lee Borden, if it wasn't for Mike. Chris wouldn't be in surgery and Ryker would probably be puttering around his workshop right now if Mike had been a dentist.
"The girls are okay, though?" She asked for the thousandth time since they'd been brought to the hospital. "They know we are all right?"
"Yeah, honey. They are fine." He said again.
"They don't know about Eddie, do they?" She asked, her voice swallowed up in tears. She sat up, clearly distressed at the thought of the girls knowing that their beloved Grandfather was ill.
"No."
"Kate will worry and then try and read everything she can get her hands on." She said turning to face him again. She turned and looked at Mike. "I wish he would . . . never, mind what I said before Terry. I'm entirely too selfish to send you home." She held her arms open and he pulled her into a tight embrace.
"It's okay." He said softly into her ear. "Ryker's tough. You know anyone tougher than that man? He'll pull through. Chris will too. You'll see." She shook with sobs and he couldn't really console her, but then what man can comfort a woman whose world has been shattered into a million pieces?
The things we do to our women. He thought again and he held her close until exhaustion finally won out and she slept, plagued by dark dreams.
***R***
Lee Borden's body lay in the morgue of Memorial hospital just three floors underneath where Mike and Jill Danko slept. The second floor held Eddie Ryker and Chris Owens, both surrounded with a team of specialists who were determined to keep them alive. The rooms buzzed with monitors that beeped and voices that directed one another to repair their badly damaged bodies.
Across town, the three Danko girls sat at a dinner table with Beth Webster who chewed at the corner of her lip as she tried to keep up with the girls' conversation. She absently spooned more food into her daughter's mouth, while glancing down at her young son, who bore her husband's best friend's name; a man who had just been shot. She ran a hand over her stomach where her tiny baby slept, growing every minute until finally it would open it's eyes to the light of day for the first time. She wondered how many faces this baby would see. Would Webster number three ever meet Chris whose dark burdens seemed to fade when smiling down at a small child or would it know the sweet sound of Eddie Ryker's laughter as he leaned in close and said, "Hello, there!" She let a long sigh escape her, and was surprised to see Kate Danko, had climbed out of her chair and was leaning against her.
"Kate?" She asked.
"You look sad, Aunt Beth." Kate said softly.
"Oh, I'm alright. I'm just so happy that your Daddy and Mommy are fine. We can go see them tomorrow."
"I know." Kate said softly. "Auntie Beth, do you believe in dreams?"
"What do you mean?"
"Do you believe that dreams are true?" Kate asked.
"Sometimes. Did you have a bad dream?" She reached out and ran a hand through Kate's long hair.
"No. I had a good one. Uncle Willie was there, and we walked along a river together. He held my hand and called me LJ - he used to call me that. He said I was just like Mommy, and called me Little Jill." She smiled thinking of it. "Anyway, in the dream we walked together and then he said, 'Don't worry, everything is going to be alright.' And then he smiled and I woke up."
"That's a good dream, honey. Your Uncle Terry dreams about him too, sometimes."
"But it is true. Daddy and Mommy are alright." Kate said smiling. "So, you don't have to be sad."
"I guess you are right. Go on and finish your dinner, honey." Beth said and rose to get some more milk for Amy, knowing that she couldn't hide the anguished look on her face from Kate, who believed that there was nothing left to fear - not knowing that at that exact moment the monitor that kept track of her Grandfather's heart completely flat-lined.